The Pod Projections are back! My projections are based on the methodology shared in my eBook Projecting X 2.0, and the process continues to evolve and improve.

2017 Pod Projections Index:
Lance McCullers
David Dahl
Keon Broxton

Last night, I needed some inspiration. Who would be tomorrow’s Pod Projection? So I asked my Twitter followers and received a slew of options. Ultimately, I landed on a player I never considered for this honor and was “voted” on by just one tweeter. Trea Turner was so good last season over just 324 plate appearances that he finished 12th in value among second basemen. He essentially matched Ben Zobrist’s value in only about half the plate appearances!

And while we throw the term sample size around all the time and stress the importance of concepts like regression, fantasy owners are closing their ears and yelling lalalalala, because they love their Trea and there’s nothing you could do about it. He’s being selected 10th overall on average in NFBC drafts and has even apparently gone first overall, while he also holds an ADP of 13.5 in Fantrax drafts. Are fantasy owners nuts or is this not a repeat case of Carlos Correa and overvaluing a small sample?

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No need to fret. The unofficial conductor, who is also the author of this post, does not expect the cabin to reach capacity. Not prior to April, at least.

Brett Lawrie’s time with any organization, not just the White Sox, was ticking away; more writing was scribbled on more walls with each passing year since his debut. So when the White Sox released Lawrie, the first thought on most fantasy owners’ minds was not Where will Lawrie end up? but, rather, When will Yoan Moncada get the call? Moncada, a consensus top-5 prospect, changed socks and is now the marquee name of the South Side’s now-promising future.

Yet one could argue Moncada’s not quite ready for the big show. After raking and running absolutely wild in High-A in 2016, Moncada graduated to Double-A and, well, his performance is open to interpretation. On one hand, his 11 home runs, nine stolen bases and .277/.379/.531 triple-slash in 207 plate appearances amounted to a batting line that was more than 50% better than the league. On the other hand, he struck out more than 30% of the time — and that lack of contact carried over into his Major League debut, during which he struck out in 12 of 20 PAs. The tools are immense, but, at 21, he could definitely use some polish, and the White Sox have no incentive to rush him along.

Allow me to (re)introduce you to Tyler Saladino.

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It’s hard to believe this is my fourth season writing these monthly tiered rankings for second base. As the old adage goes, time flies when you’re forming position-specific tiers of real baseball players for fake baseball purposes.

A clear trend that formed over the last three years of writing this column is that second base keeps getting deeper and deeper. While there are elite options at the position, the list of players that I would be okay with rostering is plenty long.

With this in mind, I decided to implement a new feature to my tiers this year, motivated by a piece I wrote on Yahoo’s average auction prices a couple weeks ago. By including this data, I hope to help you identify where hidden value lies at the position. Whether your league does an auction or a traditional draft, understanding how your fellow owners value players is vital to any preseason preparation.

Without further ado, here are your preseason second-base tiers for 2017. As always, if you disagree with my rankings — or if I missed anyone who should be ranked — feel free to sound off in the comments section. (For reference, I’m using Yahoo’s position eligibility requirements).

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Welcome to this third installment of Deep League Draft Targets, an exploration of each position’s middle and late tier players. Where mediocrity abounds, value is found. Where one man’s trash is another man’s backup left-handed platoon option.

In previous editions, we covered first base, touching on Fangraphs-favorites, Tommy Joseph and Justin Bour. The week before, Tyler Flowers, Mike Zunino, and Andrew Susac, called for our attention behind the dish. Today, we move onto second base, a position that in past seasons drew the ire of many a fantasy owner but that the roto community has lately characterized as “groin-grabbingly deep.” But is it really?

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Here’s the coldest take ever: Mike Trout should be the top pick in this year’s fantasy baseball drafts. Only slightly more lukewarm is the opinion that Mookie Betts should go second. That is the consensus among drafters in Yahoo, CBS and NFBC leagues, as well as among industry experts, according to the data compiled by FantasyPros. Jose Altuve is generally considered to be the best choice for the third pick, though Yahoo drafters are waiting until the sixth pick on average to snag the Astros’ second baseman.

If I wind up with the second overall pick in any of my upcoming drafts, I won’t be taking Betts, and I don’t think you should either. Betts did outearn Altuve (and everyone else) in Roto value a year ago, but if we take a closer look at how Betts got the top spot, it’s clear that he won’t be as likely to outgain either Trout or Altuve in value. If I can’t have Trout this year, then Altuve will be the next best thing.

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Jose Peraza’s prospect hype seemed to have stalled after a rough 2015 campaign. He had a rough offensive season at triple-A for the Braves that year and then was included in a package for Hector Oliviera at the deadline when, presumably, the Braves started to look at Peraza more as a utility player than a regular middle infielder. Peraza was on the move again a few months later and, based on his usage at triple-A and in the Majors, it seemed like the Reds were ready to roll Peraza out in that super utility role. That thought seemed to be furthered by the Reds acquisition of Dilson Herrera at last year’s trade deadline.
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Last week, I wrote a reaction piece to Yahoo’s average auction values at second base. This exercise helped me identify some trends regarding underpaid and overpaid players at the position heading into the 2017 season. One such discovery was that of Matt Carpenter’s budget-friendly $16.2 average auction price.

Considering Carpenter’s prodigious power production over the last two seasons, it surprised me to see that owners were spending more on 11 other 2B, all the way up to Jose Altuve’s steep $49.0 price tag. Specifically, I’m wondering why Carp costs about ten bucks less than anyone in the Robinson Cano/Brian Dozier/Jonathan Villar/Daniel Murphy/Rougned Odor tier. All of those players are going off the board for $25-$28.

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We’re going position by position this week and next with our initial roll out of rankings. We will update these in March based on Spring Training activity and injuries.

We’re using Yahoo! eligibility requirements which is 5 starts or 10 appearances. These rankings assume the standard 5×5 categories and a re-draft league. If we forgot someone, please let us know in the comments and we’ll make sure he’s added for the updates. If you have questions for a specific ranker on something he did, let us know in the comments. We can also be reached via Twitter:

• Paul Sporer
• Jeff Zimmerman
• Mike Podhorzer
• Brad Johnson
• Justin Mason
• Al Melchior

There will be differences, sharp differences, within the rankings. The rankers have different philosophies when it comes to ranking, some of which you’re no doubt familiar with through previous iterations. Of course the idea that we’d all think the same would be silly because then what would be the point of including multiple rankers?! Think someone should be higher or lower? Make a case. Let us know why you think that. The chart is sortable. If a ranker didn’t rank someone that the others did, he was given that ranker’s last rank +1.

Key:

• AVG– just the average of the seven ranking sets
• AVG– the average minus the high and low rankings
• SPLIT– the difference between the high and low rankings

Previous Editions:

• OF
• SP
• 1B
• SS
• 3B

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Yahoo launched their fantasy baseball site for 2017 over three weeks ago, which means that by now, there should be some solid trends to analyze in their average draft position and auction value data. There’s some surprises to be found in the early returns, so let’s dive right into the top 12 by average auction price. (When looking at the 2016 values, keep in mind that Turner and Gordon each played roughly half a season, and Carpenter dealt with an oblique injury.)

• Average auction price on Yahoo (2016 end-of-season value)
  • Jose Altuve – $49.0 ($34.7)
  • Trea Turner – $41.2 ($10.7)
  • Robinson Cano – $28.1 ($26.2)
  • Brian Dozier – $26.2 ($27.0)
  • Jonathan Villar – $26.0 ($26.4)
  • Daniel Murphy – $25.2 ($25.4)
  • Rougned Odor – $25.0 ($19.3)
  • Ian Kinsler – $17.7 ($23.7)
  • Dee Gordon – $17.1 (-$4.0)
  • Jean Segura – $16.7 ($24.9)
  • Jason Kipnis – $16.1 ($16.4)
  • Matt Carpenter – $16.1 ($7.2)

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Last Friday we kicked off our ottoneu FanGraphs points league rankings. This year the rankings will include values from myself, Justin Vibber, and Chad Young. We are presenting our individual dollar values, the average of all three individuals, plus the ranking of that average. In addition the tables below include ottoneu eligibility (5 games started/10 games played in the prior year). Players are ranked at their most valuable position, and the hierarchy we are using is C/SS/2B/3B/OF/1B (with 3B and OF being a coin toss in terms of replacement level, we chose to include 3B/OF eligibles at 3B).

Prior Rankings: C/1B/3B

Key:
Split – Difference from highest to lowest $ value
Otto.– Average price across Ottoneu FGpts leagues
AVG. – Average $ value from the four of us
(+/-) – Difference between Ottoneu average price and our average $ value Read the rest of this entry »